Happiness

This past month, our Stake (our local Church group comprised of several smaller groups or wards) challenged us as families to do something concerning Family History Work every day for 142 days! I am so impressed with our Stake for putting this out there and we've been excited to learn more about our ancestors! Some of the things we have done are: -Tell stories about Josh's Grandparents at the dinner table. -Tell stories about us growing up. -Watched a video from Neil L. Anderson's talk on Finding Our Cousins about doing Family Search as a family. -Worked on the website www.puzzilla.org -Looked at our ancestors on familysearch.org -Made an account with ancestry.com (free for all LDS familysearch users!) Some of the things we want to do: -Video tape Grandma or Grandpa Hulihan (and any other Grandparents) and download the videos onto Ancestry.com. -Add pictures or stories online on familysearch. -Find out more stories of our ancestors and write them down to ad...

Last night, around 3:30 am, Elizabeth awoke with a scary dream. Or ten scary dreams, she told me. I got her a drink, laid down beside her and when that failed, turned on the tv. We recently got a new roku machine that allows us to get the internet on our tv (with our wireless). We got it so we could watch Conference since we don't have cable (or a DVR! I know- pretty crazy, huh?). I LOVE it! You can get Pandora Radio on your TV, and there is a Mormon channel on there as well. Elizabeth and I watched a few new Easter Bible Videos and some other short, sweet videos as well. I sent her off to bed, and she fell asleep pretty quickly after that. I, on the other hand, took a little longer. One video we watched was called Arise to the Mountain. It was shown at the General Young Women's Broadcast. I loved it! I loved how pure and sweet and good those young women are. I look forward to Elizabeth being a Young Woman one day (sooner than I have expected!). Recently, I have quite a few ...

that is the signature of my Great-Grandfather. How neat, huh? Josh had MLK Jr. Day off so we headed to our local IKEA- 20 minutes away in Tempe. We had planned a hike but since it was drizzly it was canceled. I've been wanting to turn our guest room into a bedroom/craft room. There was a desk at IKEA which I love and I wanted to create a space where I can sew, blog, download pics, craft and do family history in semi-peace and quiet. Those of you who know me, know I love shopping and I love IKEA. As we dropped the kids off at Smaland, except Elizabeth who wanted to come with us, I beamed with anticipation. Josh was not as thrilled. That's ok. We found the desk, and a lamp, and 2 Christmas stars on sale (for my July 4th themed room), ate lunch (which was free since we spent over a certain amount) and headed home. A successful trip! Josh worked on his Christmas puzzle when we got home and I did some family history and found the record above. I love it! This is my blog. My name i...

So, the other day I was looking at the sidebar of my blog that has my bucket list. On it is to find a new hobby. I set out to find one! On Saturday we went fishing with the kids. Could this be a new hobby for me? I wondered. As minutes went by without catching a thing, I realized that I had no patience for it. I googled hobbies and found whittling pipes, quilting, gardening, etc. All things that take patience. Which I don't have a lot of. I put it to a matter of prayer and left it at that. That evening, Josh and I went to the Temple and were sealed for Magdalena Cera and John Drewa- my last card that I had printed out to do Temple Work with (she is my great Aunt on my Grandpa's side) and I knew. Family History is to be my new hobby. I had to search through 5 unopened boxes to find my family history binders, but find them I did! (I also found our bathroom scale in one of them- who packed that box??) I am so excited! I was talking to my Mom last night and she mentioned learning ...

I have often found that some people can say exactly what I want to say, in fewer words no less, and say them with much more grace and agility than I ever could. It is on those days, when I find something that speaks to my heart, a pure gem, you may say, that instead of writing what I was planning to write, I put it off for another day and let someone else speak in my stead. Today is one of those days. Family planning: It's none of THEIR business! I agree. Now that I have been on both sides of fertility- being able to conceive children very fast (four kids 3 yrs old and under) and not always a way we would choose (twins 20 months after our first baby while Josh was in Law School and another one due right around when he was taking the bar exam) and now our youngest is four years old and there is no new baby coming. Yet. Despite our desires and our will. It is the Lord's will what may happen. It is not about me. Or us. It is about Him. And I am grateful for all that He has gi...

On Friday Hilary- Josh's sister- called us up and asked if they could stop by in a few hours. She and her husband Dave and their four kids- Spencer, Tyler, Dallin and Brennan are back East visiting Dave's family- and us too. They were going to stop by on Tuesday, but we got to see them earlier. We didn't tell the kids, because we wanted them to be surprised! When Elizabeth saw them walking up our front walk she screamed! My kids were so excited to see their cousins and took them around our house right away. On Saturday we went to the Air and Space Museum, amidst lots of rain coming down with the approach of hurricane Hanna. We were fine, although some parts of Virginia got a little flooding. We loved seeing Hilary and Dave and are looking forward to seeing them tomorrow also! This is my blog. My name is Megan Abbott.

My sister Molly just had a baby! Yeah! A girl, her fourth baby! Charlotte Sophia. Eight pounds, 10 ounces born Sunday morning, delivery right in the wheelchair at the hospital! It was fun, because she didn't know what she was having and my Mom left a message on the phone that she had had her baby, but she wouldn't tell me what it was and everyone was at Church, so we had to wait to find out and hear the story! We are so happy and thrilled that everything went well! This is my blog. My name is Megan Abbott.

Two years ago, we were living in Eastgate Townhomes, in South Provo. Elizabeth was three, the boys were one and Asher was a little bump in my belly. Here, Elizabeth is playing Candyland with Josh. It's funny that she still loves that game. She's playing right now. Right now, we are living in Montgomery County, Maryland, in an older, but new to us home and she is playing an older and slightly more used Candy Land Game in our retro carpeted basement downstairs. She is five, still not in school, the boys are three, still in diapers, and Asher is talking up a storm lately. This is my blog. My name is Megan Abbott.

For each one of my pregnancies, I told Josh that I was expecting in the same way, but with a twist each different time. I had received a statue of a Mother and a baby one year- ok our first year- for Christmas and we decided together that if we found out we were expecting, I would take the statue out of storage and place it where he could see it. For Elizabeth: I found out on a Monday. I placed the statue on our coffee table, sat on our futon (that cost $35 from D.I. and that we still own) and waited for him to come home. He came in and said "No!!!....Way!!!" I'm glad that it wasn't just a no! For the boys: I placed the statue in my diaper bag- Elizabeth had just turned one- and we met Josh for lunch at the Creamery at BYU. I told him to look in my bag for something and he found the statue. Surprise! It should have had twins on it, though! For Asher: I wanted to do something different, but still unique. I took a picture of the statue with my digital camera and sent it...

I recently wrote a post about a letter from my Grandma Cera that I almost threw away, but didn't. I wanted to share what she wrote to me: "Dear Megan Wed. AM. May 21, 1997 ...You asked what it was like when I was your age- well there wasn't much going on. "The depression" was in the years 1929-1941- most everyone was poor (the average people) many couldn't find jobs but then in 1941 World War II (we got attached at Pearl Harbor) so the 4 years I was in High School was the 4 years the war was going on. About 12 million guys from U.S.- Most got drafted to go to war right after they graduated-They had no choice. Many (1,000's) never came back alive, many crippled. It was hard times. Things were rationed because of shortage- We had to have stamp books- for meats, butter, sugar, gas, plus shortages of other stuff because it all had to be used for armed forces- So it is hard for you to understand unless...